


Happy (Late) Secret Santa, Pizzer!

by Feavel



Category: Edgar Allan Poe's Murder Mystery Dinner Party (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Mutual Pining, oof this is messy, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-10-10 11:33:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17425100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Feavel/pseuds/Feavel
Summary: H.G. and Lenore are both messes. Adorable messes.





	Happy (Late) Secret Santa, Pizzer!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [icecreampizzer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/icecreampizzer/gifts).



> Hey, @icecreampizzer! It's me, your Secret Santa! Sorry this was so late; my life went nuts and I got serious writer's block, but I managed to force out nine whole pages--I hope you like them!

The whole plane ride home, Lenore Poe had been planning how exactly she was going to make her triumphant entrance back into her hometown. It had to be triumphant, or at least draw a lot of attention to the fact that she was back, because otherwise, she might have to think about _why_ she was back, and she didn’t want to. The breakup with Guy had _not_ been pretty. It could have gone way worse, for sure, but it also could have gone way, way better. In her defense, it wasn’t her fault he had decided to propose publicly even though she’d told him he wasn’t ready to get married just yet. She’d turned him down as kindly as she could have with easily a hundred strangers watching and judging her, and the taxi ride from the restaurant back to their apartment was possibly the worst ten minutes of her whole life. She’d moved out the next day and crashed with her friend Mary for a while as she wallowed in guilt for a day or two then tried to figure out how best to get back on her feet. As the days at Mary’s turned into weeks, Lenore had found herself retrospectively realizing that her relationship with Guy never would have worked anyway, and even though it still hurt, she was slowly becoming okay with that fact. She couldn’t impose on Mary forever, though; she had to find a place for herself, so she’d resolved to go find a place closer to her brother and her best friend, at least for the time being, and see what happened next.

She’d told Annabel and Edgar about the Guy Fiasco when it had happened, but she hadn’t told them she was planning on coming back home. That was a new decision. Besides, she liked surprising people, and what better surprise than Lenore herself, back from the dead (metaphorically, obvs)?

She knew they both still worked at the town library, where they’d worked in high school. She didn’t know when exactly they were working, but asking would have wrecked the surprise, so she figured she’d just drop in and odds were at least one of them would be there.

Lenore was surprised at how well she remembered exactly where everything in the town was, since she’d been gone for so long, but she found her way straight to the library no problem and walked right in, suitcases, garment bag, and all.

The first thing Lenore noticed was that someone she’d never met before was at the front desk, rather than Charlie, who’d been there probably since the dawn of time itself. This new person was actually pretty cute, if she did say so herself, if dressed a little weirdly. The button-down shirt and vest looked fine on their own, even though she wouldn’t have gone as formal as that vest for sitting at a library desk all day. What was weird was that in addition to the glasses on his face, this guy was also wearing a pair of goggles around his neck. Like, straight-up Steampunk goggles. Whatever, though. She wasn’t here to critique strangers’ fashion sense (yet), she reminded herself as she strode straight up to the desk and its occupant (who, she now realized, was staring back at her, probably waiting for her to come in). She was here to surprise her best friend and her brother.

“H-Hello,” Not-Charlie said as Lenore approached. “Can I—help you f-find anything?” He made eye contact for maybe half a second, then his gaze jumped to Lenore’s hair, then it darted away from Lenore entirely and he tugged absentmindedly at his shirt collar before looking back at Lenore. Was he always this flustered, she wondered, or was it something to do with her? She knew it sounded vain, but the only guys she’d ever seen get this nervous around her were always the ones who ended up asking her if she wanted to “I dunno, go to a movie or get lunch or something, just to get to know each other better—but if you don’t want to, it’s cool; it’s your call.”

_Losing track. Focus, Lenore._ She leaned on the desk and smiled, saying, “Actually, yeah. Is Annabel Lee here? Or Edgar Poe? I wanna surprise them.”

Not-Charlie, whose name tag she now saw read _H.G._ , barely got out the word “Indeed” before there was a squeal from the children’s section and Lenore jumped. Poor H.G. (whatever that stood for) nearly had a heart attack. If she weren’t focused on the source of the shout, Lenore would have found it weirdly endearing, the way he clutched his heart as he calmed himself down. But as it was, she saw a familiar heart-shaped face barreling toward her and knew exactly who it was.

“Hey, Anna Banana!” Lenore caught Annabel in her arms, and Annabel hugged her more tightly than Lenore would have thought possible.

“It’s so good to see you, Lenore! I didn’t know you were coming back! How are you?” As they broke apart, Annabel noticed the luggage at Lenore’s feet. “Here, let’s put your things in my car,” she said, already rolling Lenore’s suitcases out of the building. “How have you been? Tell me everything!” Lenore grinned—good old Annabel, always helping out—and followed her best friend out to her car.

\---

H.G. Wells had known the second he had moved to a new town that he wanted to work in a library. If he started working straight away, that would be a good way to meet people, he knew (not a huge priority for him, but even he felt lonely from time to time), and if he started working at a library, chances were good he would meet people who also enjoyed books, and that common ground provided excellent fodder for small talk, should the need arise. But more importantly, books would be a familiar, comforting sight surrounding him in an otherwise completely foreign situation.

Luckily, he’d found a library fairly quickly, and even more luckily, they’d accepted him on staff almost at once. Over the year or so he’d been there, he’d slowly become friends (he thought—he’d be the first to admit he’d never been the best at picking up social cues) with his coworkers, including the eccentric, reclusive Edgar and the kind-hearted, optimistic Annabel, with whom he got along the best.

Life was good, if mostly unremarkable, until the most beautiful woman H.G. had ever seen strode through the automatic double-doors straight toward the desk where he sat. Her suitcases, garment bag, and other travel accoutrements flummoxed H.G. some—he didn’t think one would usually come straight to a library after leaving an airport or at least travelling a long way—but more than that was the sheer confidence with which she entered, her raven-black hair bouncing in perfect curls around her shoulders and her dark eyes sparkling as though she owned the place, though he had never seen her there before.

He realized as she approached his desk that he was probably staring and should probably stop, but too late—she was asking after Annabel and Edgar. He tried to make eye contact as he responded that they were indeed working, but it went even worse than it usually did, and his gaze darted around hopelessly as he floundered, trying to formulate a more eloquent reply. Before he could remember any of the thousands of words he’d forgotten in an instant, a squeal from the children’s section pierced his brain and sent him rocketing a foot into the air. He put one hand on his chest and tried to regulate his breathing as he processed what was happening. Annabel had evidently recognized the woman at the desk; she rushed toward her and hugged her, saying how happy she was to see her and she didn’t know she was coming back (so the woman’s name was Lenore. H.G. would have to remember that), and before H.G. could get his heart rate back down, Annabel and this Lenore had left to put Lenore’s things in Annabel’s car and a patron had approached him asking after yet another James Patterson book and he had to put Lenore out of his mind for the moment.

\---

Later that day, when Lenore had convinced Edgar to let her dump her stuff (and herself) in his apartment and they were both sitting in silence in his kitchen, she decided to break the monotony.

“Hey, Edgar.”

“Yes?”

“What can you tell me about the new guy at the library? The one sitting at the desk?”

“H.G.?”

“Yeah, him.”

Edgar didn’t even put down his book. “What do you want to know?”

“Well, what does H.G. stand for?”

“I don’t know.”

“Seriously? How can you not know? You work with the guy, don’t you?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t say, and I didn’t ask.”

The next ten minutes went more or less like that as Lenore hounded Edgar with questions about H.G., none of which he knew the answers to. Just like her brother, she guessed. He wouldn’t “pry into other people’s lives” if they wouldn’t “pry into his” (his words, not hers—she would have used “get to know” instead of “pry,” but whatever). Eventually, she couldn’t take it anymore and moved to the couch, pulling out her phone as she went.

She knew that texting Annabel about H.G. was a mixed bag, because even though she was guaranteed to know more about him than Edgar did, she was also guaranteed to know (think? know? think) that Lenore was asking about H.G. because she thought he was cute. Which he was. But what was it to Lenore? Or to anyone else? She texted Annabel.

_Hey Anna Banana!_

_Hey, Lenore! What’s up?_

_Whos the new guy at the library? HG?_

_H.G.! He’s a sweetheart, and incredibly smart._

_What does HG stand for?_

_Sorry, I don’t know. I asked him once, and he said it was embarrassing, so I left it alone._

_Youre way too nice Annabel_

_:-)_

_Whats he like?_

_Well, like I said, he’s super-sweet and very smart. He doesn’t talk much, but I don’t think it’s because he thinks he’s better than anyone, I think it’s just because he doesn’t think he’s that good at it._

The more Lenore learned about H.G., the more questions were raised and the more she wanted to know. And it wasn’t like she had that much else to do—she resolved to visit the library again the next day and get to know him better.

Why was she doing this? She’d just gotten out of a relationship and now she was fixating on a new guy. No, it wasn’t like that. She wasn’t interested in him romantically; she was just curious, because she’d never seen someone get so flustered so fast around her, and she hadn’t seen anyone just casually wearing Steampunk goggles out in public besides at RenFaires and stuff, and it had to take a certain kind of person to pull that off, and it seemed like he was that kind of person—it worked for him, anyway. And sure, he wasn’t exactly hard on the eyes, but she hadn’t looked that closely. There was no way she had a crush on him this fast. That kind of thing only happened in movies. This was just because she was bored and had already watched _Queer Eye_ all the way through, like, thirty times.

\---

Several weeks had passed and, H.G. observed, not a single day had gone by without Lenore Poe (she’d introduced herself the day after her arrival as Edgar’s sister and Annabel’s “BFF”) striding through the double doors and marching straight up to his desk to talk to him. It wasn’t that he didn’t enjoy it—she was a perfectly pleasant person, if her outgoingness was somewhat intimidating—it was just confusing, because she never wandered through the shelves like the other patrons. She never checked out books; she never so much as left the Reference section, where the front desk ( _his_ desk) resided, except upon occasion to say hello to Annabel. She only ever walked up to his desk, sat or leaned on the edge of it, and talked to him for anywhere from ten minutes to two hours before walking right back out. He couldn’t comprehend it.

One day, the bewilderment was simply too much. He had to ask.

“Lenore?”

“Yeah?”

“I—I’m terribly sorry if—if I’m crossing a-a line here, but I, ah, noticed…” How to say it tactfully? He didn’t want to offend her by coming right out and asking _why are you in a library if you’re not reading anything_ , but now that that question was in his head, he couldn’t figure out another way to phrase it. To her credit, she didn’t interrupt him; she let him suss out the words. He wasn’t sure whether to be grateful that she didn’t steamroll past him and start talking again, as had so many people in the past, or to be increasingly worried at the sheer amount of time it was taking to form a simple question.

“I—I noticed that you’ve been in the library every day for—for the past several weeks, and, er—that isn’t a bad thing—but I don’t understand…y-you haven’t checked out a—a single book.” He waited with bated breath for a reply, and only had to wait perhaps a quarter of a second.

“What would you recommend?”

He blinked. He didn’t know what he’d been expecting, but it wasn’t that. “I—pardon?”

Lenore shrugged and grinned effortlessly. “Well, I’ve never been the biggest reader, so I don’t really know what I like. What would you recommend?”

H.G. steels his nerves. “Well, ah, I—I quite enjoy science fiction—I write it myself, in fact—though I’m not certain how much you would—”

“Can I read it?”

For the second time in as many minutes, H.G. was caught completely off-guard. “…I’m sorry?”

“What you wrote. Can I read it?”

Oh, dear. He had said that, hadn’t he? His pulse quickened; in the past, when people had asked to read his work, it hadn’t ended well. They usually derided him for writing about things that didn’t exist (yet—he always added the “yet”) or, worse, asked him why he was wasting his time and talent doing so. But Lenore seemed sincere, and she hadn’t made fun of him (yet—oh, dear). Surely it couldn’t hurt to show her one thing; what could possibly go wrong? She could do what everyone else had done and look down on him, that was what could go wrong.

He forced those thoughts to the back of his mind as he stammered out something about how he had never been published, so all his work was on his Cloud drive, and—before he knew it, a phone was being shoved into his hands. He stuttered to a halt. “Wh-What do I do with this?”

Lenore laughed, though not unkindly. “You put your number in it, Goggles. And you give me yours so I can put my number in it, so you can text me a link to your stuff and I can read it.”

He had no choice but to accept the offer, and even if he’d had the choice, he didn’t think there was a single universe in existence where he’d refuse it.

\---

After that encounter (H.G. was so _cute_ when he was flustered, and even cuter when his eyes brightened at the mere mention of sci-fi), Lenore went straight back to Edgar’s apartment and sat on her bed to start reading H.G.’s story. She didn’t know what had possessed her to ask for his stuff—she knew how much Edgar hated being asked if people could read his writing before he was ready, and wasn’t that a thing with writers anyways?—but she figured, looking back, that if he had mentioned it himself, surely, he wanted people to read it? Or at least was willing to let them read it? That seemed to be the case; he had texted her a link, after all. Lenore began to read.

She had meant to only read a chapter or two and then go to bed, but almost right away, she’d gotten sucked into the story of a nameless time traveler who traveled hundreds of millennia into the future, and as she closed that window on her phone, she glanced up at its clock: _3:57 AM_. Holy crap, she needed to go to sleep. But she also needed to tell H.G. right away that his story was killer. So right then and there, she texted him.

_Hey HG your story was SO GOOD_  
I loved it  
For real  
Got anything else I can read?

Lenore didn’t expect H.G. to respond until a more human hour, but as she crawled into bed a few minutes later, her phone buzzed with an _I’m glad you liked it_ and another link. She sent him a _thx_ and went to bed, deciding to read it the next day.

\---

H.G. woke up more violently than he expected to a loud buzzing from his bedside table. Surely it wasn’t time for him to get up already; his alarm hadn’t gone off. He groggily flipped over his phone and read the texts that had woken him up: Lenore had enjoyed _The Time Machine_ and wanted to read something else he’d written. He didn’t know what was coming over him—it almost certainly had something to do with the fact that he was only barely awake—but as he entered the link to _The War of the Worlds_ in the ‘Reply’ bar, he suddenly switched windows and created a new document: a single page, blank but for the words “Would you like to get coffee together sometime next week?” He deleted the _War of the Worlds_ link and inserted the link to the new document in its place, hitting ‘Send’ still in a haze and going back to sleep.

\---

Lenore woke up and, instead of browsing her social media over breakfast like normal, opened Messages and clicked on the link H.G. had sent her the previous night (or really, several hours ago, but who was counting). Her eyebrows furrowed as she saw that there was only one line of text, and when she processed what it said, she nearly choked on her orange juice. How would she respond to that? Her instinct was _hell yes, I’ll get coffee with you_ , but she wasn’t sure. She’d only just acknowledged her feelings for him, like, ten seconds ago when she’d realized she wanted to say yes!

She locked her phone in a panic and stuffed it in her pocket, putting her dishes away and only half-paying attention to where she was putting them.

Most of the rest of her day was spent stewing and pondering how long she’d felt this way about H.G. and how long she’d known he felt the same way and how she’d been sure he wouldn’t make a move because she knew him better now and she’d known (or thought she’d known) that he wasn’t the make-a-move type and how did she even know that that text was H.G. making a move? He could have been asking her to platonic coffee; that was a thing people did, right? That was definitely a thing people did and that was probably what H.G. was doing. It’d be hella vain of her to think that he had a crush on her just because he was asking her to coffee.

What even were emotions anymore?

\---

H.G. woke up that morning and unlocked his phone to check the day’s weather forecast, as usual, but when his phone unlocked, he didn’t see his home screen, as usual; he saw his text conversation with Lenore from mere hours previously. And he’d replied to her compliment: _I’m glad you liked it._ And a link. That was odd; he had no memory of sending her another piece to read. He thought he’d gone back to sleep without replying. He clicked on the link to see which piece he’d sent.

His eyes darted across the single line of text and his heart stopped. _Oh, dear God, he’d invited her to coffee._ What had he been thinking? What would _she_ think? He’d known for quite some time that he’d have loved to get to know her better and hopefully one day start courting her (he knew no one called it ‘courting’ anymore, but there was some connotation to ‘dating’ that he couldn’t put his finger on that he’d never liked; it seemed shallow, he supposed— _not important now, Wells_ ), but he’d also known that there’d been no possible way she felt the same. Surely, he’d set himself up for failure here. And all because of one delirious decision at 4 in the morning. Oh, no.

He hurriedly tapped back to the conversation to see if she’d replied. _Read 4:23 AM._ Oh, dear. Wait, what time was it now? _8:04 AM._ Oh, _dear_. He was late for work. He rushed to the library, forgetting to even grab a protein bar or a banana for breakfast on the way; he was too worried about Lenore and what he would say to her when she showed up to the library that day.

\---

Lenore didn’t show up to the library that day. She straight-up forgot; she was too busy pacing Edgar’s apartment and calling unbiased-third-party-friend after unbiased-third-party-friend asking for advice (Oscar was particularly unhelpful) and eventually calling Annabel and asking her to come over. Annabel accepted, because obviously, and said she’d be over around 6, when she got off work. Even the mention of the library didn’t jog Lenore’s memory; she was too worried.

\---

Lenore didn’t show up to the library that day. H.G. was even more skittish than usual for his whole shift, glancing at the door every thirty seconds and stammering so much as to render himself almost completely useless on general reference.

Halfway through the day, Annabel put the “Sorry we missed you! Be back in a moment” sign she’d made on the front desk and tapped H.G. on the shoulder, saying lightly, “H.G.? Could you help me in the back room for a moment?”

He jumped. “Oh! Er, abs—absolutely.” He followed her into the back room, which she locked after they entered. Oh, no.

She turned around to face him and his stomach dropped. He knew exactly what this was about. To her credit, though, she was gentle (as always).

“H.G., are you all right? You haven’t been yourself today.”

“What? Oh—I—yes. I’m—fine. It-It’s just, ah…I didn’t get enough sleep last night. That’s all.”

Annabel raised her eyebrow as though to say, _Are you sure?_ H.G. crumbled.

“Can—Can you—keep a secret?”

“Of course.”

“Even from…Lenore?”

Annabel smiled. “You’d be surprised.” (Surprised he was, and—truth be told—a little frightened at how easily she’d smiled, as pleasant as the smile was.)

“I—I think—I think I may be…may be… _inlovewithLenore._ ”

Annabel’s smile widened. “Well, that’s great, H.G.! Then what’s bothering you?”

Once H.G. started, he couldn’t stop. “I—I love her. I love her, but I fear I may have ruined everything, because she’s not here for the first time in months and it just happens to be the day after I—after I…” Turned out he could stop.

Annabel’s brow furrowed. “What did you do, H.G.?”

He explained the texting fiasco from the night before and watched in bewilderment as a smile crept across Annabel’s face. It almost looked like she knew more than she was letting on. Or his imagination was getting away with him.

Annabel said, “I don’t think you’ve ruined anything, H.G. She’s probably just trying to figure out how to reply. You know, when we were in high school, there was a boy she had her heart set on dating, so she worked up the courage to give him her phone number, but when he texted her, she was so scared that she took a whole two days to figure out exactly how to respond so she didn’t seem too clingy but not too aloof either.”

H.G. blinked. “Really?” He’d never thought of Lenore as the type to worry about how she came across in texts. That was usually his own terrain.

Annabel smiled. “Really. So just give it some time, okay? I’m sure she’ll reply when she knows what to say. Are you ready to go back out?”

H.G. took a shaky breath, released it, and nodded. Annabel led the way out so that H.G. wouldn’t see the relief on her face—he’d bought her made-up story. It was the thought that counted, though, and it wasn’t like this was out of character for Lenore, she told herself and she and H.G. returned to the library.

\---

Annabel got to Lenore and Edgar’s apartment a little after 6:30 and found her best friend sitting on the couch staring fit to bore holes in her phone, which was resting on the coffee table in front of her.

“How long have you been sitting there?”

Lenore jumped, but relaxed a little when she saw who it was. “Annabel, what do I do? Is he being serious? Is he asking me for coffee, like, as friends, or is he asking me on a _date_ -date, or is he playing a mean joke on me, or is some friend of his playing a mean joke on him and I’m just collateral damage, or—”

Annabel held up her hand to stop Lenore. “First, you’re not collateral damage for anything, okay? Second, we missed you at the library today.” As an expression that could only be described as _oh, shit_ dawned on Lenore’s face, Annabel continued, “One of us was especially worried.”

She explained H.G.’s jitteriness throughout the day and her back-room conversation with him, and Lenore couldn’t decide whether she was relieved or even more scared. Probably both. But H.G. liked her! Like, for real! The question was real!

Before she knew what she was doing, she was asking Annabel when the library closed and Annabel was saying, “Seven o’clock,” and she was checking the clock and _oh God it’s 6:56_ and Lenore was out the door and tearing to the library on foot and as she sprinted across the parking lot she saw H.G. unchaining his bike from the bike rack out front and she was shouting, “H.G.!”

He jumped a foot in the air, and his eyes widened when he realized it was her. “Oh—Lenore—I didn’t think you’d—”

“I’ll totally go get coffee with you I’m sorry I didn’t reply or come see you today it’s just that I got really thrown for a loop and I kinda panicked and I’ve been trying to figure out what emotions even are all day ‘cause now I’m thinking about it I think I’ve actually liked you for a really long time but I kinda ignored it until you asked me for coffee and then I just went ‘oh my God do I like him does he like me what even are emotions what do I even say to him’ and that’s kinda what my brain’s been doing all day and oh my God please stop me from talking I’m making an idiot of myself.”

The next several seconds, wherein both H.G. and Lenore stood in silence, processing what had just happened, were the tensest several seconds of Lenore’s life. After what felt like an eternity, H.G. spoke quietly.

“You—you’ve liked me f-for a long time?”

Another pause. Lenore formulated a response as best she could.

“Well…yeah. Since the day we met, I think.” H.G.’s eyes widened even further, and Lenore continued hurriedly: “I dunno, at first it was just something about how flustered you were around me and I went, ‘Hey, he’s kinda cute,’ and eventually ‘hey he’s kinda cute’ turned into ‘I don’t get a word that’s coming out of his mouth but he’s so excited and he’s super cute when he’s excited and I love how much he cares about his nerdy stuff’ and I guess that turned into ‘I love him and I hope he cares about me as much as he cares about his nerdy stuff, because I can totally see myself spending the rest of my life with him.’”

Even more silence as they both realized exactly what Lenore had just said. She’d said she could see herself spending the rest of her life with H.G. And now that she thought about it, she totally could, and it wasn’t like she could take it back. H.G. took a deep breath, and Lenore tensed. He was going to turn her down, wasn’t he?

“I—I can assure you, I—care about you—even more than I care about my—‘nerdy stuff.’ I have done since the moment I first saw you. You—you walked in, and you were the most beautiful person I’d ever seen. You were so—so confident—and you asked if Annabel or Edgar was in, and something in me just—stopped. I—I’d forgotten every word I knew, and before I could remember any of them, you were gone, and it—it was like I-I’d seen a ghost, and I didn’t know what to do. Then—then you kept coming back and I kept not knowing what to do and eventually I—I realized what I g-guess I’d known all along…” He looked down at his shoes, took another deep breath, and looked Lenore in the eyes, and it was the most intense, most sincere, most wonderful eye contact she’d ever had with another person. When he spoke again, it was very quiet, but clear as a bell. “I—I love you, too. And I would gladly spend the rest of my life with you.”

Lenore let out the breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding. She tried her best to grin the way she always did, flirtatious and easy, and she said, “Well, let’s start with coffee first, huh, Goggles?”

His laugh was the most beautiful sound she’d ever heard, and the way his puppy-brown eyes crinkled made her heart feel like it was growing three sizes in her chest, and as he tentatively wrapped his arms around her and she returned the hug, she knew everything would turn out fine.


End file.
